Ultimate Game Design : Building game worlds

Building Game Worlds
114
U L T I M A T E G A M E D E S I G N
vastly different physical sizes fighting each other (for example, think of Yoda fighting
Count Dooku in Star Wars Episode II, or a dwarf fighting a giant). A dwarf punch or
grab hits a giant’s shinbone. A chest-high grab for the giant versus a dwarf collides
with nothing.
Programmatically, and as part of your toolset, you will be tuning collision boxes
or collision areas to trigger certain events. Collision boxes determine where the two
fighting actors or characters “collide” with each other. This occurrence will trigger
an event. Among other uses, these events trigger physical animation reactions to
punches, kicks, grabs, and weapon use, or display events like blood-spray particles,
sweat sprays, or tooth chips. Ouch!
Fighting games are starting to incorporate more prop use. Fight characters can
grab items in the scene (such as bar stools) and use them as weapons. This kind of action
calls for the same kind of scripting that you might use in any other third-person
action game.
Multiple fight settings have created a demand for much more elaborate fight levels,
as the fight drifts or wanders through an environment. Gone, it seems, are the
days of the relatively fixed-view fighting game as the genre continues to grow.
Expanded fight modes allow fighters to pair up with computer-driven fighters in
tournament modes, and bring single-player action elements to fight games, rather
than just a one-on-one setting or a simple tag team. The fight genre remains a very
popular genre, yet it reserves plenty of room for growth into the future. Fight games
with far greater dimensionality loom on the horizon.
PUZZLE GAMES
Sometimes it seems like puzzle games or “puzzlers” get forgotten. How many times
do you see huge ads for a new puzzle game? It’s happened, but it’s rare, and it depends
on your definition of “huge ads.” Tetris is a landmark game title, and a point
of pop-culture history at this point. Some of the most popular games for the so-called
“casual” gamer are straight puzzle games or puzzle-related inventions.
At this moment, many people the world over are playing and enjoying puzzle
games. You may be called upon to try to create or rethink a puzzle game. The game
audience by age might be young kids, teens, middle-30s, or seniors. The puzzle game
you are asked to build might not be focused on age at all, but they tend to be.
It’s no secret that puzzle games can be highly addictive and, therefore, very successful.
Some attributes of puzzle games to consider include
� Light on art assets
� Deceptively simple game mechanics